


Heightened Senses

by afrocurl



Category: Veronica Mars (TV), Veronica Mars - All Media Types
Genre: Canon Character of Color, Gen, Introspection, POV Character of Color
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-03-27
Updated: 2011-03-27
Packaged: 2018-02-13 11:34:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 873
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2149209
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/afrocurl/pseuds/afrocurl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He’d been watching her more and more since <i>she</i> was killed, making sure he made up for the times she couldn’t be with her friend.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Heightened Senses

**Author's Note:**

> Betaed by the lovely [](http://starxd-sparrow.livejournal.com/profile)[**starxd_sparrow**](http://starxd-sparrow.livejournal.com/), and originally written for the first challenge at [VM Ficticious](http://vmfictitious.dreamwidth.org). It has been edited from the original posted version there.

Blending in was never something he was good at, but he managed to avoid being noticed too often as a function of the entire social structure in Neptune.

_No one wanted to notice him or his friends._

He constantly used that phenomenon to suit his needs - it helped to create a sense he and his friends were somehow sinister, evil, and to be avoided - but it also helped him to wander through campus looking at people (for the purposes of getting them later) to observe them all.

Of course there were particular people he always watched from afar—the jackass 09ers who fucked up his beach and belittled his abuela, and the lonely girl who used him time and time again.

The girl. He’d been watching her more and more since _she_ was killed, making sure he made up for the times she couldn’t be with her friend. He watched as the school rebelled against her, for Lilly.

He watched as she morphed from someone light and airy into someone hard and solid.

He watched as she took her rage from Lilly’s death and turned it into a business.

He especially watched her when she stayed out too late on the wrong side of town looking for trouble.

-

Sometimes he’d watch her, knowing full well that she was paying equal attention to him. It didn’t bother him so much because he knew she was keeping her interests with him in mind.

However, when life returned more or less to normal, he noticed her hanging around with all the 09er jackasses, the ones who made his blood boil, and not just in passing. Veronica was in Journalism with them now, with Duncan and the pain in his ass, Logan Echolls.

But it wasn’t either of them that had him most concerned; he knew they all had been friends _before_ , and no matter how much they wanted to avoid each other, they all shared a common bond.

There was this one, though, a new prick who moved into town. So far as he knew, the kid made him angry.

With Duncan and Logan, he knew, they would always have a relationship; there would always exist some give and take between frienemies, though they’d never go back to where they had been before. But anyone else, even that new black kid, put him on edge.

The new guys didn’t know her, didn’t know how to read her, how to respond to her dry sense of humor.

-

Casual and continued observation told him she seemed happier, if a little afraid of herself.

Rumors around campus flew after her first date, ones that she’d run away screaming when he went in for a kiss, but that seemed too skittish even for her.

Careful attention must be paid so he could keep her safe; Lilly would have wanted someone to do that.

-

Another rumor floated through campus. This time, Troy had lost his car on the way back from some dumbass trip to Tijuana with Logan and Luke.

Waiting for the moment she’d come to him for help, he sat back, still watching as he tried to understand exactly what she saw in this new guy.

-

Her habits were comical. She walked up, shy and innocent, asking for a favor. _Of course._

Saying yes, he’d help her find her idiot boyfriend’s car, or at least keep a look out for it.

It was all he had to say to set everything else in motion.

-

Given their history together, and all that she had done to help him avoid going to jail for Chardo’s mistake, he was sure there was something with her that kept her coming back time after time.

He wasn’t stupid enough to think it was love - he’d never had that before - but there was something she never said. Whatever it was, it hung between them each time she talked to him.

The right opportunity would present itself, and he’d be ready for it.

-

Like always, rumors buzzed through campus about her, only this time it wasn’t so much that she’d blown the entire O-line of the football team. This was a rumour of her return to the rein of queen bitch, ruined by Troy sprinting as far as he could away from her.

_It was a lie. It always was._

His careful observations told him she wasn’t likely to pine away for this one - he wasn’t Duncan (whatever that meant) and he wasn’t Lilly (obviously), but he was someone she’d let in.

It seemed likely that she wouldn’t do that again.

_At least not unless the right person came along._

-

His tio kept asking about that fancy car, and all he said was that it wasn’t an issue anymore.

Work at the shop kept him busy, but weeks later, tio still commented that he’d been distracted: the engine on that Chevy told him everything his tio hadn’t actually said.

-

How he ended up in front of her apartment, he wasn’t sure. It wasn’t like his bike magically drove itself here, but he wasn’t going to waste the chance.

She was going to know what he really through of all her previous men, and he was going to prove that he was better than all of them.


End file.
